Getting rid of unwanted bleed after Tracking

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Greenlander
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Getting rid of unwanted bleed after Tracking

Post by Greenlander » Fri Apr 09, 2004 2:30 am

Hey,

If anyone has any suggestions for the problem I'm facing I'd really appreciate it. It's pretty specific so I'm gonna have to describe it in detail. I recoded drums and a scratch guitar for a song a while back. The setup wasn't particularly pro and despite our efforts, some of the scratch guitar ended up in the overhead mics. I didn't mind at the time particularly, a bit of bleed is ok by me and I was probably thinking wistfully of some classic Neil Young record.

Until I added the guitars and went to mix the thing. Then I realised that I'd been lax and the scratch guitar turned out to be out of concert pitch. To make matters worse, there are a couple of points in the song where all that's going on at the time is

1.The wash of the cymbal.
2.The main guitar.
3. The goddam bleeded scratch guitar.

And it sounds bad. You can really hear the pitch variation and it's ugly as hell. Fortunately I have a digital setup so have a vague set of options. I initially tried simply taking down the o/h but there's nothing left of the drums when I do. I tried EQing out the guitar but it removed the bulk of the snare sounds from the overheads no matter how precise I tried to be. It just didn't sound good.

So now I'm not sure what to do. Anyone have any ideas? I know, I could re-record and I probably should but the drum sounds is good, as is the performance, so if there was anything else I could do I like to give it a try. I was thinking pitch-shifting. Anyone ever done this to o/h?
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Re: Getting rid of unwanted bleed after Tracking

Post by joeysimms » Fri Apr 09, 2004 6:48 am

You said you're happy with the drum sounds, so given that, I'd simply overdub some other percussion, maybe some rice in a tea tin, tambourine, even another cymbal, and use that instead of the 'infected' track. That's the easiest, the most fun, and i guarantee it will help you look at the overall arrangement in a fresh way.

Anything else, and you're treating it like a "problem". Just have fun.
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Re: Getting rid of unwanted bleed after Tracking

Post by ubertar » Fri Apr 09, 2004 6:50 am

Well, I don't know if this will help because I don't know what you're recording into. If you're mixing digitally, there are noise reduction options that might work. In Samplitude (what I use), you can select a clip to represent "noise": I think the function is called "get noise". Find a spot in the track where there is nothing but the unwanted guitar and select that as your noise. Then you can use noise reduction on the entire track to get rid of it. This has worked very well for me, but you have to be careful not to overdo it or you'll get some ugly digital artifacts.
I don't use protools but I'd bet they have a similar function.

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Re: Getting rid of unwanted bleed after Tracking

Post by vvv » Fri Apr 09, 2004 1:04 pm

Try to copy and paste the O/H from a different place in the song.

Or, you might try a High Pass and Lo Pass filter or other EQ to get what you like and can save of the track at the "bad part", and then add an effect over it.

For example, when I had a stereo track of two crashes and an out of tune guitar fading out, I EQ'd the guitar out as best I could, and then added mondo delay and reverb for a "big effect" effect.

It kind of sucked, but less than it did, if you understand me.
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Re: Getting rid of unwanted bleed after Tracking

Post by kayagum » Fri Apr 09, 2004 1:13 pm

Umm... not to be an asshole, but have you thought about rerecording the track? 8)

(Reason #43635 why you can't fix it in the mix)

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Re: Getting rid of unwanted bleed after Tracking

Post by JGriffin » Fri Apr 09, 2004 1:15 pm

It's a little old school, but: tune the new guitars to the scratch guitar. If the scratch guitar is in tune with itself, you've got no worries. Don't worry that the track isn't tuned to a concert pitch--lots of classic tracks are a little sharp or flat of A440. This wil only get you into trouble if you're gonna add a piano or vibes or something else that can't be easily re-tuned.
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Re: Getting rid of unwanted bleed after Tracking

Post by dayvel » Fri Apr 09, 2004 1:23 pm

I think you're on the right track with the pitch-shifting idea. I think you'll have to shift all the drum tracks and not just the overheads, though; it will sound pretty weird if you just shift the OH (but it might sound cool.)
For the parts where the guitar gets out of time, you'll have to look for sections where the guitar player got it right that correspond to that piece of the song and cut-and-paste. If you didn't cut to a click you'll probably have to do a fair amount of nudging and stretching to keep the time-feel right.

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Re: Getting rid of unwanted bleed after Tracking

Post by logancircle » Fri Apr 09, 2004 1:59 pm

I agree, why not just retune the instruments you're overdubbing to be in tune with the orig scratch guit? If you had to add a piano in there, just have the pianist suck it up and lay that down on top of the out-of-tune scratch/drums, then pitch-shift the piano instead of fucking with all the high frequencies. Pitch-shifted cymbals often sound out of wack, but altered pianos are easier to accept. If you must have an untunable instrument I would do that, otherwise retune. Or re-record the whole thing.

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Re: Getting rid of unwanted bleed after Tracking

Post by trashy » Fri Apr 09, 2004 2:14 pm

I agree with dwlb, logan (and others): tuen everything to the scratch and pitch shift the pianos. Just to make sure everyone knew I wasn't joking, I'd pitch shift the hell out of the thing - like maybe a fifth lower...maybe even more. Maybe I'd do two takes of piano and have one pitch-shifted up and one pitch-shifted down. Maybe two piano takes within a couple cents of each other, but still not fully in tune. And maybe add a vibrato-y chorus effect. Really mess it up.

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Re: Getting rid of unwanted bleed after Tracking

Post by joeysimms » Fri Apr 09, 2004 2:21 pm

For some reason unknown to me (maybe I don't read too good..) I was operating under the assumption that the scratch guitar was out of tune with itself, in addition to not being off of a440..

If it's just tuned lower / higher than concert, than I completely agree with pitch shifting to fit the other stuff in. I also agree with Trashy's suggestion to really mess it up, but if it sux, blame him!
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Re: Getting rid of unwanted bleed after Tracking

Post by leigh » Sat Apr 10, 2004 2:08 am

Greenlander wrote:I know, I could re-record and I probably should but the drum sounds is good, as is the performance, so if there was anything else I could do I like to give it a try. I was thinking pitch-shifting. Anyone ever done this to o/h?
The problem with pitch-shifting mutliple mics on one source (like multiple drum mics) is that they lose their phase relationships. Plus of course those watery artifacts that everyone loves. If you like the drum sound that you have, you may lose that by pitch shifting. Try it and see.

Using broadband noise reduction (sampling a "noise" part of sound) as ubertar suggested won't work very well to eliminate a changing sound like a guitar part.

I would focus on the sections where the guitar bleed really seems to stick out. If all that's going in those sections (from the drum tracks) is cymbal wash, why not overdub just some clean cymbal wash to stick over those parts?

Leigh

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Re: Getting rid of unwanted bleed after Tracking

Post by New Orleans Steve » Sat Apr 10, 2004 2:26 pm

That's 2 good sugestions, retrack OR tune the later gutiars to the first one.
But wait, 1st try OD a corect gutiar. you might be suprised that the new one will totaly make the first one inaudiable.
I know it sounds crazy. But just try slaping another coat of gut. over the one you already have!

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Re: Getting rid of unwanted bleed after Tracking

Post by super skoda » Sat Apr 10, 2004 3:47 pm

Have you tried setting up speakers in the room and playing back the close miced drum tracks and recording that. I guess it would be kind of like a reverb chamber or something.

I imagine it won't sound the same as live drums but I bet you could get the room sound back.

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Re: Getting rid of unwanted bleed after Tracking

Post by darkskyy1 » Sat Apr 10, 2004 7:51 pm

maybe try duplicating the OH tracks and eqing the duplicates so that all you have left is the scratch guitar bleed and then try mixing it in out of phase with the original track, may not work as a perfect fix but the results could be interesting, we often do the same thing with the hum from guitar amps

just an idea

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Re: Getting rid of unwanted bleed after Tracking

Post by Greenlander » Mon Apr 12, 2004 2:45 pm

I'm actually having serious problems finding a pitch shifter decent enough to do the job. I use Tracktion as my app, so I'd need to pick up something with precise, upward and downward, chromatic pitch control. Haven't found one yet, any suggestions?

Actually the most effective treatment so far has turned out to be Floorfish, one of the freebies in the wonderful fishfillets family. It's a gate of sorts, I'm sure 90% of people who use VST effects have it.

Thanks for all the suggestions, apart from the re-recording one. Only kidding, although my aim was to try and avoid that.
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